photo credit: K3ntFIN – Travelling. Back in a week.
Training Motivation With Dogs
I think dogs have higher training motivation than most humans. Here’s why I think this. During weekends, I like to take my two dogs Chester and Roxie to the leash-free dog parks we have out here in Mississauga. When we are at these parks, at some point, as in all our outings and walks, I like to put them through a drill that involves them staying in place while I move away at a distance.
They are commanded to hold this position for 60 seconds and then I call for them to come to me. While this drill is quite easy inside the house, it is always more of a challenge outside where there are other distractions. This is especially true in dog parks where there are other dogs running around.
I noticed that other dog owners sometimes also put their pets through various training drills at the dog parks too. Some play the ball chase and retrieve routines while at this one specific park where they are equipped with agility apparatus, dogs are put through even more challenging drills.
I started to put my own two dogs through some of these agility drills too this summer. They are going through jump over elevated bars as well as a special ramp and so far so good in terms of progress.
Dogs Never Complain About Training
One thing I noticed with dogs is that they never complain about training. They are always eager to do their drills no matter what time of day it is. This training ethic seems to be built into them. If only us humans had this same type of training motivation.
Imagine how much more we could achieve in our lives if we all had this higher level of training motivation that dogs do. In cases where some dogs have clearly not had enough training, it’s the owners themselves who were the weak links here.
The dogs would have been more than willing to learn. It’s the humans that did not have the training motivation to educate themselves and work with their dogs. This is especially apparent with new dog owners who are negligent in getting the right education about training including both obedience and potty training dogs.
To help out new (and established) owners out, I shot a free dog training video that demonstrates the basics of obedience that represent what I consider to be the minimum standards all owners should learn with their dogs. Check it out if it applies to you and/or share it with people you know who could benefit from it.
By the way, I just saw new 2012 dog calendars out. Many are by different dog breeds. Worth a look.
Now for us humans, think about the training motivation that dogs have. Again, if we can develop the discipline to always do what we have to do to achieve our goals without complaining like our canine friends do, we would be so much more successful in our lives. Let’s learn from them.
